Trilby: The Art Of Theft

eMTe · Post by **eMTe** » Mon Nov 12, 2007 16:10

1991. Two years before the events of 5 Days A Stranger. The eccentric British cat burglar Trilby is at large in an American city, robbing the rich to give to himself. Distrustful of his fellow man and patiently skilled in every aspect of burglary, Trilby is on an ongoing quest to scare the ignorant rich by hitting them where it hurts - their wallets. But will his arrogance cause him to bite off more than he can chew?

In The Art Of Theft the player controls Trilby in a 2D stealth adventure as he embarks upon a number of daring high-profile heists in various outposts of wealth and power across Chapow City. With an arsenal of thief skills at his disposal, he must lift the trinkets and valuables of the idle rich while making as little fuss as possible.

Developer: Ben 'Yahtzee' Croshaw

http://curlysworldoffreeware.com/game_i ... gameid=166

eMTe · Post by **eMTe** » Mon Nov 12, 2007 23:45

Pretender to Game Of The Year title.

Scythe · Post by **Scythe** » Tue Nov 13, 2007 17:17

Feels very much like something I've played before... Sort of Impossible Mission and Elevator Action, with stealth (thankfully those were fun games - I especially love EA). But it seems there's also an unfolding story here and the purchasable upgrades are a nice addition. Plus, it's funny to play an arcade game made with AGS.

Sort of like playing Breakout made in RPGMaker 2K...

But Game of the Year contender? Well, not if you ask me. A little too derivative. I do look forward to playing it some more when I get home though.

Scythe · Post by **Scythe** » Wed Nov 14, 2007 11:52

I ran into some annoyances. Most notably, the font used during missions is awful. Often I had to examine items several times just to understand what it said. Sometimes I died because I couldn't read it in time. Another thing is that the controls aren't quite slick enough. I don't know if it's really a sluggishness, but I just don't feel like I'm in complete control.

A third thing is that it's sometimes very hard to figure out the amount of shadow in areas where you're not yet standing. Finally, the wire cutting is really annoying, since it's pure chance.

Even though the cameras annoyed me endlessly as well, those have rhythm, so it's my own fault. It is, however, very frustrating to step through doors or change floors to a camera location, because you have to figure the animation time as well, in order not to step right out in front of the camera (happened about 50 times to me...).

The best levels are definitely the pure heist ones, where you're just robbing some more or less random people (in that respect it's similar to "Thief") - the story (or task) levels are not as much fun.

Overall, the amount of annoying factors start to outweigh the good ones once the difficulty cranks up and the game becomes less forgiving. This is only somewhat offset by the upgrades you can buy. The first several levels are really a load of fun though.

eMTe · Post by **eMTe** » Wed Nov 14, 2007 23:17

Hm. I think you misunderstood the concept.

Things you say are frustrating are made so on purpose. Being a thief you examine items in a hurry and sometimes you're not able to read them carefully. As for shadows, cameras and wires, remember you enter the building for the first time - mistakes are unavoidable. This is the life of thief!! Game has great replayability: you can not only repeat your mission - you can repeat your mission with newly gained abilities and try to beat your best score in different way.

Scythe · Post by **Scythe** » Thu Nov 15, 2007 1:11

What I'm saying is that these things make the game frustrating for me to play, whether or not they're intended to be - and that's a minus for a player and means that I'm less likely to come back and play later, because what I remember most vividly is the frustration, not the fun.

If these are design choices, then they do not agree with me.

And telling me that the font is bad on purpose sounds just plain wrong to me.

Pater Alf · Post by **Pater Alf** » Sun Nov 18, 2007 17:41

Here's the link to a walkthrough (just in case that anyone needs it):

http://crystalshard.net/?f=theft_wt

Pitkin · Post by **Pitkin** » Sun Dec 02, 2007 14:35

eMTe wrote:Pretender to Game Of The Year title.

No wonder the topmost thought in my head while playing this is all the time, "now this has got to be the best game I've played this year!"

Absolutely, I've not seen a more entertaining game for a long while; dunno if my love towards Yahtzee's games and slick thieves in geneal makes me subconsciously biased, but whatever; picking a lock in corridor with guards, just to slip into a room with a surveillance camera... no matter how much I curse and swear when the alarms go off the final time, this game is made of pure 'win', to quote the annoying saying. ^^

eMTe · Post by **eMTe** » Wed Jan 09, 2008 0:32

Small correction. To the official description.

I didnt call Art Of Theft "game of the year". I called it "pretender". Which means if there were a contest held I would submit it as one of the contestants. Hurrican beats Trilby 5:1 in quality. If not higher. Pretender, not best game. Period.

Scythe · Post by **Scythe** » Wed Jan 09, 2008 1:14

"Contender" perhaps?

eMTe · Post by **eMTe** » Wed Jan 09, 2008 7:51

No. Why?

Who cares anyway.

Pater Alf · Post by **Pater Alf** » Wed Jan 09, 2008 21:02

eMTe wrote:Small correction. To the official description.

I didnt call Art Of Theft "game of the year". I called it "pretender". Which means if there were a contest held I would submit it as one of the contestants. Hurrican beats Trilby 5:1 in quality. If not higher. Pretender, not best game. Period.

Ok, I will change the description as soon as we have a working edit tool again... which probably means not in the near future

Post by **Chroelle** » Fri Jan 11, 2008 15:59

I can change it. I will make the change today, since I have to try and change whatever it was that was incorrect with Scythes adding previously this week.

Scythe · Post by **Scythe** » Fri Jan 11, 2008 16:05

My problem seems to be that when I add .txt files, the line breaks are destroyed. I uploaded the file again, so you can see what I'm talking about. It works fine on my own comp. Hence, I uploaded an .rtf version, which seems to keep line breaks intact, and we could just do away with the .txt version.

(Of the ATOTK 100% solve, that is)

Post by **Chroelle** » Fri Jan 11, 2008 16:28

Done and done!

eMTe · Post by **eMTe** » Sat Jan 12, 2008 23:09

And sorry, Ben. Platformers are sometimes better than adventure games.

Holy ****, Ive finally admitted it! My psychoanalyst will be pleased!

Maz · Post by **Maz** » Sun Jan 13, 2008 0:07

Scythe wrote:My problem seems to be that when I add .txt files, the line breaks are destroyed. I uploaded the file again, so you can see what I'm talking about. It works fine on my own comp. Hence, I uploaded an .rtf version, which seems to keep line breaks intact, and we could just do away with the .txt version.

(Of the ATOTK 100% solve, that is)

That's becuse Unix and Windows mahines have different type of linefeeds. You can over come the pb by using text editor which understands different types of linefeeds - and allows conversions. On linux almost all editors can do that. n Windows I use metapad.

Oh, it may clear things up if I remember to say that CWF resides on linux server...

Maz · Post by **Maz** » Sun Jan 13, 2008 0:12

heck. I had forgotten the edit tool...

Scythe · Post by **Scythe** » Sun Jan 13, 2008 0:24

I just avoid .txt, that's easier.